Airports Suck

I left the house at 1:30AM, my mom and grandma drove me to the Appleton airport to board the plane at 5:30AM, apparently you need to check-in 3 hours early for an international flight.
I almost missed my second flight because the first plane was late taking off and we ended up waiting (flying in circles) for another plane to land before us. The sunrise was beautiful though.
Atlanta airport was hellishly huge. I got lucky and noticed a subway type thing that just happened to be going to my gate, yes, the airport is actually so big they need a train (subway?) to get you from one end to the other fast enough. By some insane chance, the gate I landed at was at one end of the airport and the gate I needed to get to was completely at the opposite end of the airport and... only 20 minutes to check-in to my next flight.

However I did check-in with about 5min left. I was next to the-guy-that-talks-to-much and the crying baby but almost everyone was speaking Chinese so I was still happy.
14 hours on a plane didn't sound so bad somehow when I read it, now I never want to get on a plane again.
It wasn't even the sheer boredom, so much as the fact that I think I started to lose feeling in my legs after about 8 hours, and the fact that I still had 6 more hours to go made me want to cry (I didn't.)
I tried to sleep but only succeeded in actually falling asleep for about a total of 2 hours and only about 30min each time. Next time I'll bring more of my own food, I had changed my meals to vegetarian which ended up being totally ridiculous because all they did was take out the meat, no protein added. No wonder I was so tired!

Finally we landed. Pu Dong airport was surprisingly easy to get though even though it was mostly in Chinese, it was also beautiful, they had hanging plants all over. My luggage was the very last to come out.

I got out of the airport and it was very hot and humid, but at the end of the exit line was Wu Zheng Ping waiting and smiling.

*picture Pudong airport, which is gorgeous.

Chicago

I went to Chicago to get my Chinese visa, which was a lot of waiting but actually very simple.

*the Chinese consulate building through a rainy car window*

The next day I got to spend a few hours at the Art Institute of Chicago. I eventually made my way to the John S. Sargent paintings and got stuck, spending at least 20min at each one.

I was also shocked and amazed to learn that they allow cameras in the museum. 

This is the sculpture gallery. It is amazing. I could spend all day in just these two galleries. However I did get to all the galleries that were open (some areas are under construction.)

And this is a Sargent painting. very different from anything I've seen in a book. I forgot the title, some kind of flower.